23 Responses to “Boobs”

As if the world knows what any woman’s body means. Internalised misogyny gets us all, but it’s saddest of all when it has us chop up our bodies like there’s some kind of safety inside, just an incision or two away.

Am I the only one who finds this really annoying? What is she raving about? What’s with the breast obsession? I’m a lifelong Lesbian who fell in love with girls from my earliest memories, but I never craved breasts… I loved girls and women’s hearts, souls, eyes, and certainly vulvas, which can give such ecstasy when you love someone, but not just isolated body parts. Perhaps the male objectification of breasts makes me not focus on them, but they are only one part of a woman. Calling them offensive names as this woman does, doesn’t help. I remember Lesbian comedian Wanda Sykes joking about how she didn’t need to go to a strip bar since she could play with her own breasts. I understand not wanting something so objectified on your body, but then to obsess about them on other women is odd. And once again, a very feminine woman seems to think she’s somehow a man. And once again, another confused Narcissist ranting and craving the attention she seems to object to getting.

Nope, you’re not alone. The rantings of a narcissistic cultist don’t make for good poetry. Especially “performance” poetry–most of which comes out like macho howls of Ginsberg or the ravings of Serano about his magical dick.

Thanks, I’d thought that was what our champion meant. I’ve heard a quite feminine woman pretending to be a man at an event reading her whining about how she wasn’t recognized at her high school reunion. Well, how could she be with her facial bone structure looking male, plus the male-patterned balding beginning. It’s just amazing how everything is always about them and of course they make no sense.

At first I thought it was good because I thought it was ironic which is smarter than earnest. Sadly, I think it was earnest which is just depressing. And it pisses me off. As a mother of one with a daughter that does have big boobs, what can I say–she pleads–please mommy so and so got a reduction and this one got a reduction and the other she got a reduction and a nose job. She has stopped asking but it always tapers off in winter and flares in the warm weather. They get these girls from all sides. And the doctors are making a killing literally.

Christ, so much muddled thinking: ‘I’m more than my body’ , then why change it? If the focus of the self is more than flesh and bones then you can transcend the body and be who you like. You don’t escape materiality by focussing back on that very materiality of the flesh. She admits gender is in language and naming (that the world calls her ‘she’) but then reverts back to the disgust with the body so prevalent among trans. Trapped in other people’s perceptions? Then change the perception, not the body! My body isn’t ‘wrong’ she says, then goes on to describe why it’s like being colonised by something (using a ridiculous metaphor about an elbow penis!!) and needs mutilating. It started so well too, I just thought it was a nice dykey poem at the beginning. Shame.

What I liked about it was its very muddledness. It’s honest. I thought she did a good job of expressing her internal confusion, though of course I don’t know what her intent was. I hope she can process it further.

‘It’s not healthy to feel unsafe in my body’ she said – and who could disagree with that? And changing her body is going to make her any safer?

A former friend of mine objected strongly to the word ‘boobs’ on the grounds that ‘boob’ (in English usage – not sure about US and elsewhere) is a synonym for mistake. She frequently – likewise – uttered c**t whist eschewing vagina on similar, etymological grounds, despite the commonplace use of the former as a slur.

It’s interesting and disturbing, that dysphoria in FtT centers on the breast more so than the genitals: a secondary rather than a primary sexual characteristic: but it parallels MtF – and males general – obsession with overt, visual signifiers of sex and sexual desirability. i.e. large breasts, large penis. It’s almost like guys are looking for really obvious indicators that their sexual feelings are valid, and perhaps FtT have internalized this idea?

I wonder if this boobs!-introduction isn’t short-hand or code for “I’m a good queer, just like you hetero folks, please like me”…

I have made the experience that men sometimes try to “bond” with me by trying to talk about women with me, assuming that my perception of women is the same as theirs. So I must be just as obsessed with disembodied parts of female bodies as they are. They are always baffled when I give them a disgusted look and go back to ignoring them (luckily, I don’t have too much to do with men, only when I can’t avoid it in professional settings). I observe the same on tv, in comedy etc. It is always assumed that men and Lesbians have the same objectifying gaze (e. g. Shakesville). At the same time this plays into the theory of sexual orientation, that limiting of Lesbian love and life to a simple sex practice.

This IS slam poetry, i. e. competitive and audience-oriented. The boobs!-introduction therefore may be nothing but a clever trick to get the audience on her side. BOOOBS! is something the men and the “sex-positive” libfems can get behind, after all.

Confusion is part of being young, I suppose. And this kid is confused. (Breasts are not ‘sex organs.) But when the confusion clears you can’t have your breasts back. Too late. I wonder how it will all look to us in 30 or 40 years?

I couldn’t watch this. I had direct experience hosting a slam-poet queer – and attending his stage performance after giving him ride to and from my island. It made him really angry that I didn’t question his gender or talk about his outlandish get-up. He had boobs, very long curly hair but chest hair and thick hands and big jaw. Quite an astonishing combo of fashion – very grease paint clown look. His angry slam made references to people in the audience that didn’t even know his gender and acted all nice and friendly….something like that.

His name was Soledad at that time. This case reminds me of him, and I didn’t want to watch words used as poetry that are twisted by anger….and would prefer when these poets come back when they can enlighten, soften our hearts with understanding and just speak the truth not twisted fallacy and delusion speak.

This poem is a perfect distillation of “Gender Week” at the Feminist Times. Which was/is this: “female” is ugly, messy and dirty and the root of all the world’s problems, so let’s chop it up into tiny, meaningless bits and use it as fertilizer to grow a new kind of feminism that puts non-females in charge. Ah, much better.

It wasn’t that long ago that FT had to have it explained to them what ‘women only’ space actually means. There was one hilarious Twitter exchange where they suggested that someone disagreeing with their terms of reference should ‘pitch’ an article to them.(They rely on their readers writing the content for nothing so they can get clicks and donations) The person’s Twitter handle was Pegasus bug; they had no clue who she was!! I have tales to tell about FT: just waiting for the right opportunity. They are exclusionary, elitist and have no real knowledge of, or commitment to feminism. Always beware the ‘inclusive’, ‘we embrace all feminisms’ stance: it’s not as neutral as it looks and is just a liberal acquiescence to the false notion that all positions are equally valid. Very handy if you see feminism as a source of income and want to commodify it but the contradictions of holding so many opposing theories together will make FT collapse in the end.

Thanks for the info, Sula. Hope I’m within earshot when you find the opportunity to tell your stories about them!

I can tell you that they certainly didn’t “embrace” my (our) kind of feminism because they only published a couple of my comments, though I was thoughtful and restrained. I’m still fuming about what John Stoltenberg did there during their “Gender Week.” What a shit show.

Sorry, didn’t know where to post so I just clicked the plastic surgery category.

m2t in tears after surgery: http://youtu.be/JRP8m0W8jJ0
You can practically hear the unspoken words that he can’t believe he jeopardized his life for some ridiculous delusion. I wonder what actually has to happen to these dudes before they admit they actually did make a horrible mistake.

Also, same tranny posted a life story. Spoiler alert: He liked pink and didn’t like ‘boy’ toys. But I also heard eerie echoes of elliott rodger, talking about how he was so jealous of his sisters being female, how his strategy in high school was to befriend the best looking girls so the guys would leave him alone for being gay. Girls are people not human shields, sir! http://youtu.be/elMsnC5U3-E

All women feel unsafe in their bodies because male violence. It’s what all women have to navigate through every single day. Women are made to feel as though they are never sexy enough, pretty enough for men. Women are shamed for their bodies. All women at some point have hated their bodies. Men make women feel uncomfortable and unsafe all the time just because they are female. As a poster above said, welcome to womanhood.